She was recalled from her musings by a stir. Two ladies entered the room--the elder with an indescribable brio. Madame Gay had been a celebrity of the Empire, and kept about her an extraordinary aroma of those great days, a suggestion of staff-officers, mamelukes, the flash of sabres in the sun and the dust cloud over wheeling squadrons, seeming indeed as if she might at any moment break into "Partant pour la Syrie" or some hymn to Glory and Victory. Mademoiselle Delphine gained by the contrast with her parent. Tall, well-built, with a fine head beautifully set on an equally fine neck, clad in a simple white semi-classical dress wearing no ornaments, and with her abundant fair hair hanging in ringlets, she had something of the air of a sibyl. She looked about twenty-five, but was in reality a little older.
Madame Gay settled herself, and the Tenth Muse was led to a chair apart--an honourable chair, whose horse-hair seat was painted with roses and camellias. She composed herself in a suitable attitude, brought her beautiful bare arms to one side, clasped her hands loosely together, and, looking up at the ceiling, began to recite in a grave, deep, almost languorous voice, her poem on the last days of Pompeii, commemorating the fate of Théora the priestess of Apollo, and the young warrior Paulus, and recounting how, two thousand years after,
"On trouva dans l'enceinte où le temple s'élève Sur l'autel une lyre ... et près du seuil un glaive."
"Is it not touching!" said the purple lady to Horatia. The green plumes in her headdress quivered, and she dabbed her eyes rather ostentatiously. "Ces pauvres gens.... Ah, she is beginning again!"
This time it was a Hymn to Ste Généviève.
"Patronne de France, amour de nos aieux ..."
At the conclusion of this poem, amid the hum of applause, Madame Gay was observed to approach her offspring, and to whisper something into her ear. The poetess shook her head; then, seeming to relent, and smiling, she announced
"Le bonheur d'être belle. Dedicated to Madame Récamier."
"Quel bonheur d'être belle, alors qu'on est aimée! Autrefois de mes yeux je n'étais pas charmée; Je les croyais sans feu, sans douceur, sans regard; Je me trouvais jolie un moment par hasard. Maintenant ma beauté me parait admirable. Je m'aime de lui plaire, et je me crois aimable.... Il le dit si souvent! Je l'aime, et quand je vois Ses yeux avec plaisir se reposer sur moi, Au sentiment d'orgueil je ne suis point rebelle, Je bénis mes parents de m'avoir fait si belle. Mais ... pourquoi dans mon coeur ces subites alarmes?-- Si notre amour tous deux nous trompait sur mes charmes: Si j'étais laide enfin? Non ... il s'y connaît mieux! D'ailleurs pour m'admirer je ne veux que ses yeux!-- Bientôt il va venir! bientôt il va me voir! Comme, en me regardant, il sera beau ce soir! Le voilà! je l'entends, c'est sa voix amoureuse! Quel bonheur d'être belle! Oh, que je suis heureuse!"